In jazz music, tribute albums are two a penny, with such giants as Duke, Trane, and Miles having literally dozens (hundreds?) of albums paying tribute to them. By contrast, in improv, tribute recordings are almost unheard of. The reasons are all too obvious; there are no compositions or arrangements to cover, and to ape another player’s sound or style would usually not be seen as a tribute but as plagiarism: all of which makes this album a fascinating oddity. Subtitled “variations on the music of Evan Parker”, it is released on Parker’s own label. Furthermore, Joel Ryan has frequently collaborated with Parker in concert and on disc, helping dispel any notions of this being an attempt to cash in on Parker’s name.

Ryan is not a sax player; he came to music from science, and his chosen medium is electronic processing and manipulation. Although an American, he is often described as “the wizard of STEIM studios in Amsterdam”. Here, he takes short fragments of Parker’s playing and uses them as the source material to create his own electronic compositions in the studio. The results range from pieces where that source material is quite evident to others that have no apparent link to Parker or his saxophone.

The opening track, “Two/Cut”, sounds like an abstracted version of one of Parker’s circular breathing passages, full of repetition and unexpected overtones. What has been lost is the tone of Parker’s sax; the somewhat chilly (and chilling) electronic sounds do not have the engaging warmth of Parker’s soprano, but the form will be very familiar to Parker aficionados. By contrast, “Throbdrone Solo” (great title—can’t you almost hear the music?) sounds more reminiscent of one of John Butcher’s extreme investigations of saxophone technique than of Parker’s own playing.

[Cue rant.] These tracks that still sound like saxophone bring out strong Luddite tendencies in me; one of the many reasons that Parker’s music is so impressive is his technique, his triumph over the sheer physical difficulties of producing his music in real time. When similar results are produced by machines, that technical aspect counts for nothing; the music must be judged solely on what one hears (as distinct from how that sound has been produced); the product is all, not the process. Either way—product or process—I prefer Parker’s own music to these variations. [OK, rant over.]

The tracks that succeed best are those that are furthest removed from the source material; they sound like nothing except electronic compositions. Two of them have similar (punning?) titles: “Or air” and “Òrais”. As is so often the case with electronic compositions, they are best described by analogy. “Or air” is quietly understated, shimmering and ghostly, sounding most like one of those supposedly supernatural recordings that purport to capture on tape voices from beyond. “Òrais” (literally translated as “a tumultuous noise”) builds slowly from almost nothing, a freight train approaching from afar; it justifies its title soon enough with its gut shaking low frequencies. It bears no relation to any saxophone music I have ever heard! In several ways, this album is best summed up in two words used above: chilly and chilling.